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Roz Ritter

  • Home
  • The Past is the Past
  • Reflections on an Ordinary Life
  • If it Wrinkles
  • ABSTRACTS
  • Artist Statement
  • CV

Reflections on an Ordinary Life explores family relationships, personal transformation and upheaval through an intimate lens and challenges social mores, societal expectations and class structures during the 20th Century. 

39 McLellan Street, The Bronx

39 McLellan Street
39 McLellan Street

A favorite time from my youth was when my father would bring me home Little Lulu Whitman comic books. In this piece I recreate a memory from pages from one of those books, about the bully who took my “baby carriage” while I was walking through the park across the street from our apartment building.

Oil Cloth, hand embroidery, photo transfer

21 x 29 x 5

2014

39 McLellan Street
39 McLellan Street

Oil Cloth, hand embroidery, photo transfer detail

39 McLellan Street
39 McLellan Street

Oil Cloth, hand embroidery, photo transfer detail.

More Things to Do

More Things to Do
More Things to Do

This piece, with it's oversized Brownie tie, represents the expectations and burdens imposed on girls who were raised in the 1950's. 

Vintage Brownie Dress (circa 1949)
Polyester fabric, embroidery thread, photo transfer from Brownie Scout Handbook

68x24x6
2011

More Things to Do
More Things to Do

Vintage Brownie Dress (circa 1949) detail

The Great Unknown

  The Great Unknown   Hand embroidery, Kozo Paper, Boro Boro, photo transfer. 1953 6th Grade photo belonging to the artist.  22 x 29  2016   What lies ahead for a girl graduating from 6th grade in 1953?

The Great Unknown

Hand embroidery, Kozo Paper, Boro Boro, photo transfer. 1953 6th Grade photo belonging to the artist.

22 x 29

2016

What lies ahead for a girl graduating from 6th grade in 1953?

Roz Ritter_The Great Unknown_detail 1.jpg

I Believe

I Believe
I Believe

Embroidered from 1953 6th grade autograph book belonging to the artist. hand-dyed cotton, oil cloth

38"x15"

2016

Hopes for a girl graduating 6th grade in 1953

Front Cover_detail
Front Cover_detail
detail_Go little book....
detail_Go little book....

Archie's Girl

Archie's Girl
Archie's Girl

This piece is an exploration of how comic books informed teenage girls about relationships between the sexes. 

Vintage 50’s letterman’s jacket, Archie/Betty & Veronica Comics, Crinoline Petticoat, fifties accessories, tea-dyed felt, fabric, pearls, collage, stitching.

63x38x22

2012

Archie's Girl
Archie's Girl

Poodle skirt and crinoline petticoat, pearls detail.

Archie's Girl
Archie's Girl

Vintage Archie/Betty & Veronica Comics, collage, stitching detail

 

Archie's Girl Detail
Archie's Girl Detail

Vintage 50’s letterman’s jacket detail.

Self Portrait (1962-1977)

Self Portrait
Self Portrait

My transformation from a 1950’s housewife in Los Angeles to living in a tipi in the San Cruz Mountains. I embroidered the story on my wedding dress which I deconstructed to represent the damage I did to my marriage in the process.

c.1962 deconstructed linen wedding dress (belonging to the artist), hand embroidery, photo transfer.

61 x 26 x 2 

2013

Self Portrait
Self Portrait

c.1962 deconstructed linen wedding dress (belonging to the artist), hand embroidery, photo transfer detail. 

2013

Self Portrait
Self Portrait

c.1962 deconstructed linen wedding dress (belonging to the artist), hand embroidery detail

2013

Self Portrait Detail
Self Portrait Detail

c.1962 deconstructed linen wedding dress (belonging to the artist), hand embroidery detail

2013

pg 165

pg 165
pg 165

When my first son was 2 years old, Dr. Spock's, Baby and Child Care was the mother’s bible. On pg. 165, he said “never allow your children to sleep in your bed". One night, I walked my 2 year old son back to his own bed 41 times, completely against my natural instinct.

Vintage 1960’s pattern maternity dress-machine made, hand embroidery, Dr. Benjamin Spock 1960’s “Baby and Child Care”, photo transfer.

70 x 22 x 20”

2013

pg 165
pg 165

Pattern maternity dress-machine made, hand embroidery detail. 

2013

pg 165
pg 165

Dr. Benjamin Spock's Baby and Child Care shredded pages detail.

2013

"You look Fat"

"You look Fat"
"You look Fat"

Hand embroidery, applique on vintage girdle

10x11x6

2016

As long as I can remember I had a belly! In Junior High my girlfriends rang our door bell and ran away, leaving a girdle on my doorstep.

"You look Fat"_back
"You look Fat"_back

"You look fat", he said when I put on my bikini at the beginning of summer. Not long after I read an interview in the National Enquirer with Jack LaLanne, the fitness guru. It said, "the new diet craze is to throw up after you eat", adding, "it was good for your stomach muscles".

Bingo!

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39 McLellan Street
3
39 McLellan Street, The Bronx
More Things to Do
2
More Things to Do
Roz Ritter_The Great Unknow.jpg
2
The Great Unknown
I Believe
3
I Believe
Archie's Girl
4
Archie's Girl
Self Portrait
4
Self Portrait (1962-1977)
pg 165
3
pg 165
"You look Fat"
2
"You look Fat"